


And the moon will keep my secrets

by petrodobreva



Category: Schitt's Creek
Genre: Alexis is not at her best, Canon Compliant, Family Dynamics, Light Angst, M/M, Marriage, Patrick trying to be a good husband, Post-Finale, anon prompt from tumblr, david is upset
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-30
Updated: 2020-05-30
Packaged: 2021-03-03 04:08:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,837
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24448618
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/petrodobreva/pseuds/petrodobreva
Summary: David just came back from visiting Alexis in New York. It didn't go well. Patrick is worried about it.
Relationships: Alexis Rose & David Rose, Patrick Brewer/David Rose
Comments: 17
Kudos: 217





	And the moon will keep my secrets

**Author's Note:**

> Prompt from Tumblr Anon: how about david + Alexis getting into a pretty bad fight and Patrick trying to navigate that.
> 
> Thank you to @maxbegone ([AO3](https://archiveofourown.org/users/maxbegone/pseuds/maxbegone) and [Tumblr](https://maxbegone.tumblr.com/)) and @[roguebabyinyourstore](https://roguebabyinyourstore.tumblr.com/) for being beautiful betas!

“I am _never_ speaking to her again!”

Patrick’s husband had been home for an entire five minutes before letting out what was bothering him.

“That bad, huh?” Patrick asked.

“I cannot _believe_ her. That thoughtless, selfish little b—”

Patrick interrupted, “David—”

“I’m serious, Patrick. I am done with her.”

David had just returned from a five-day trip to New York to visit his sister for her birthday. Apparently, it hadn’t gone well.

David was still talking. “You know, I was actually really looking forward to this trip? Despite all the bad memories. Despite the fact I had to stick to that _travel budget_ you gave me. Despite the long-ass drive to the airport. Despite the long-ass flight _in coach_.”

David looked, for want of a better word, haggard. His hair was sticking up in different directions and his eyes were missing their usual sparkle—the effects of a two-hour-flight and a four-hour bus ride. He continued his commentary, “I thought she was fucking _maturing_. But no, she might not be a pathetic little dingbat anymore, but now, she’s a duplicitous, self-serving…”

Patrick winced. Alexis and David poked each other’s buttons all the time. They were always on each other’s case about one thing or another. Patrick was used to the bickering. He was used to one of them taking it a hair too far and then backtracking and trying to make up for it. One of those times ended up with David hanging thirty feet in the air by a harness. Patrick has never seen it get this bad before, however. David was really angry and really hurt.

“What happened, exactly?”

“I don’t…” David started, hesitantly, “I don’t even know how to say it.”

Apparently, in addition to her new position with Interflix, Alexis also had a few freelance projects going on her own time. One of her clients was a poet and conceptual artist, Ismene Shadravan. Ismene also happened to be someone David used to date. Or sleep with. Or whatever.

The labels they had or had not used was not the point. The point was that Ismene was a “heart-eating harpy” and the source of a lot of heartache for David. Not only was Alexis collaborating with her on the publicity for the launch of a new multi-media photo essay, but she had deliberately kept it from David. To the distress of everyone involved, he found out anyway. In the least desirable way possible.

First, there was the selfie. Ismene posted it on Instagram, but David saw it on Twitter because somebody he _hadn’t_ blocked yet reposted it. Alexis was at work, so David had gone out for a solo brunch at Balthazar in commemoration of his last day in the city. He got the alert as he was walking down the hallway back to Alexis’ place.

He barely had any time to process the way Ismene and Alexis’ faces were pressed together in a clearly very recent photo (Ismene was wearing new Miu Miu) when he was forced to come face-to-face with the woman herself.

She was sitting perched on a stool in Alexis’ tiny kitchen, tapping away at her phone, drinking tea from one of Alexis’ mugs.

What proceeded was an extremely awkward few minutes in which, somehow, despite all that Ismene had done to him, _David_ ended up on the defensive. He didn’t want to think about it, but he was pretty sure that at some point he said something about “being in a really good place” and “personal growth.” Ismene had sneered at that, as if she had the capacity for understanding self-improvement beyond month-long detoxes in Darjeeling.

_“She broke up with me when her new followers plateaued and then proceeded to name-check the gallery on Twitter!” David screamed at Alexis as he hurriedly packed up his things. “She said we were the vanguard of the commercialization of the new aesthetic movement! I couldn’t book any new artists for a full two months! Only eighty people came to the metalworks opening!”_

_“I’m sorry I didn’t remember that you dated her for two whole weeks!” Alexis yelled back._

_“She stole my vase!”_

_“Oh my God, David. I will buy you a new vase!”_

_“It was an irreplaceable Cody Hoyt!”_

“That does sound bad,” agreed Patrick when David was finished recounting what happened.

“I hope they both fall off the Empire State Building,” David said.

* * *

After a week, David and Alexis still hadn’t talked. Patrick was getting worried.

His first instinct was to stay out of it. Alexis and David got into rows all the time, and they normally just agreed to get over it. Patrick sometimes contributed here and there, but they had all this history and these weird life experiences that Patrick couldn’t penetrate.

His second instinct was to intervene. He could take charge, confront both of them, and make them talk to each other. He thought about calling Alexis himself and trying to fix it.

He also thought about just taking David’s side, to be angry at Alexis on David’s behalf. David’s past relationships and his former galleries were especially sensitive for him, and this situation involved both.

This wasn’t the first time Patrick had heard of Ismene. He first learned of her when he and David were still dating, and had just ventured into conversations about their past relationships. When David told Patrick the story, Ismene wasn’t just a random hookup who talked shit about him online and stole his stuff. She was somebody whose opinion David cared about, whose work he admired, and she was just using him—for a fuck, for more followers, for a line in one of her poems about vanity. Until he noticed the vase was gone, David took all of it really seriously and internalized everything.

Patrick and David were on a lunch break when they talked about it again. David’s phone buzzed with a FaceTime call from Alexis.

Patrick watched as David stared at it, hesitating.

“Do you want to answer it?” Patrick asked.

David put the phone down. “Not right now.”

“I’m upset with her, too,” Patrick tried, unsure if it was the right thing to say.

David raised his eyebrows. “You don’t think I’m being stupid and overdramatic?”

“No,” Patrick replied. “I think you’re in the right. She shouldn’t have gone behind your back like that. She knew what she was doing, and she didn’t tell you about it.”

David’s shoulders slumped and he nodded.

They left the conversation there. For the rest of lunch, they talked about the remodel plans for the master bathroom.

* * *

That night, after tucking into bed, Patrick broached the subject again.

Late-night pillow talks became a sacred space for Patrick after they got married. They had to be intentional about it. After getting married, Patrick felt so many things in their relationship shift. It had something to do with becoming an institution. While they were still two completely separate individuals, with their own goals, dreams, and desires—a new form of partnership had taken shape.

Patrick realized that his time was no longer his own. The decisions he made, big or small, directly impacted David. He had to say things like, “I’m going to the grocery store, do you want anything?” when before, he would have just gone without consulting anyone. Despite the extra consideration it took, Patrick loved the new meaning that was suddenly attached to all of his thoughts and choices.

A new space between them had formed as well. A space where they held their own secrets, things that were only their business. In this moment, it was a space where David could say things about Alexis that he didn’t really mean, or didn’t really expect—and he knew that it wasn’t permanent. There existed a stillness and a security in that space they built between each other.

Flirting and dating changed as well. Before they were married, flirting was like asking a question. “Do you like me? Do you like this?” After they got married, saying, “I like you in those jeans,” became an affirmation, a proclamation, likes saying, “I’m flirting with you because you’re the object of my affection, my number one priority, the person I will intentionally make feel attractive for the rest of my life.”

After getting married, everything that had to do with David was attached to that phrase. _The rest of my life_.

It stood to reason that, like everything else, their late-night conversations would change, too. Back when they were dating, whispered confessions, banter, and declarations of love happened until late hours of the night by default. It’s because there was always the anticipation of an end to their time together. Sure, they worked together and David slept over more nights than not, there were still always anxious separations.

Now, the anxiety about “enough time” had been replaced with, “the rest of our lives.” They woke up together every morning, worked together throughout the day, slept together at night. They showed up together to parties and town events and left together when they were over. They were always next to each other, and when they weren’t, they would text.

As a result, they had stopped whispering to each other in the darkness between the time of going to bed and falling asleep.

When you feel like you have all the time in the world, sometimes you forget to treat that time with purpose and deliberation. If they wanted to last forever, they would have to work on forever.

But that time, spent together, rubbing his hand up and down David’s spine, analyzing old memories, problem-solving, imagining dreams in the safety of a dark room was something really important to Patrick. So, he voiced that. That’s something else they were learning to do in their marriage, voice their desires.

“I think we should go back to having late-night conversations in bed,” he said to David one morning.

And because working on things your partner needs is also part of marriage, David had worked on it.

Tonight, Patrick began. “So what do you think you’ll do about Alexis?”

“I really don’t know,” said David.

“What do you want to happen?” Patrick pulled David into his chest.

“I guess,” David started, “I want her to drop Ismene, admit what she did was wrong, and get her act together. I want her to think about how her actions affect other people.” Late-night conversations did not require realism. David could say whatever he wanted, and be safe in the knowledge that he could revise it later. Late-night conversations were for wishes and hopes that seem silly in the light of day.

“I mean, what does that say about our relationship?” David continued, “What does it say about her priorities?”

“Have you guys ever had a fight like this before?”

“No,” David said, and then after a moment of thought, “before we moved here, it was like it was beneath us to care about each other. We hurt each other all the time, but would never admit that’s what we were doing. Like, I would go after her tutors, dance instructors, friends, crushes. Just for the hell of it. Because I was horny and they were available. Alexis would too. If back then, after everything with Ismene went down, if Alexis had turned around and like, befriended her and brought her on one of her beach vacations, I wouldn’t have been surprised.”

“But now you have an actual relationship,” offered Patrick.

“Yeah. Now that we’re actually trying to be brother and sister. Now that we’ve been through—” David waved one of his hands “—everything. It’s like, it’s not just hurt from someone who doesn’t give a shit about you anyway. It’s like an actual betrayal.”

“What did Alexis say in her messages?”

Patrick expected David to pull out his phone, but instead, he just answered, “She said that she’s sorry. She said that she took Ismene on as a client because she thought it was the correct thing to do. For the money, for networking. She said she didn’t think she’s in a place where she can pass up opportunities.”

“And what did she say about not telling you?”

“She didn’t address that,” David said, curtly.

Patrick sighed. “It’s probably because she felt guilty.”

“Yeah, well, that might mean something if she even acknowledged that keeping it from me was wrong.”

“Do you think she will?”

“I really don’t know. I would have thought so, but it’s already been a week.”

Patrick considered the conversation. He hoped he was handling this correctly. Family drama was tricky. Most of the time, everybody was doing their best to get along, thinking about everybody as on the same team. But when there was a conflict, boundaries were reinforced and relationships were prioritized. Like reassembling the team. Patrick and David are married, so they always stuck together. They protected each other and ran point with their own families. David, for instance, protected Patrick from Moira’s unrealistic expectations and demands, from Johnny’s inappropriate questions and out-of-touch suggestions. Patrick protected David from his mom’s questions about kids and the future, from his dad’s awkward ignorance of queer politics and culture.

Most days, Alexis was Patrick’s sister too. But if she and David were fighting, it was David’s business. David would take the lead, and Patrick would support him.

Patrick plants a few kisses on David’s forehead.

“I don’t want to make this about me, but I just want to check…” Patrick began.

“Mmm?” David murmured.

“What should I be doing in this situation, exactly?”

David chuckled. “Oh I don’t have any fucking idea.” He smirked. “I’ve never been married before.”

“Well,” said Patrick, “I guess I’ll just say that I’m with you on this and that I, too, hope she gets her act together.”

Patrick could feel David smiling into his chest. “Thanks, honey.”

“Should _I_ talk to her?” Patrick tried.

“Oh no.” David sat up to look at Patrick. “Just keep doing what you’re doing. Be my husband, keep working on making our dreams come true, hang out with me, make me breakfast…”

Patrick rolled his eyes for David’s benefit.

David continued, “I’ll figure it out with Alexis, it’s between us. I just like to know you’re in my corner.”

* * *

It took another week before David and Alexis talked again. It was a response to a message she sent late at night that said, “I dropped Ismene.” He called her the next morning.

“I’m sorry, David. I should never have taken her on in the first place. I didn’t like it from the beginning, but I figured that letting your history with her get in the way would be the unprofessional decision,” Alexis explained. “After I went into the contract with her I still felt so guilty and conflicted about it I was scared to tell you.”

She apologized, also, for David having to run into Ismene in person, and for the selfie.

“I didn’t think you would see it,” she admitted, “I didn’t think you had Instagram.”

“I do for the store,” David answered. “But anyway, I saw it on Twitter, so…”

“Twitter?”

“Yeah, Jacqueline reposted it and I still get notifications for her. Anyway, you didn’t have to drop Ismene as a client just for me.”

“Actually, I did?” Alexis said it like a question. “I, like, talked about it with this girl I know who’s sort of being like my mentor? She told me because of our personal history that it was kind of a conflict of interest, so I probably shouldn’t have taken the job in the first place without considering that.”

“Oh wow.”

“Yeah, like, apparently it’s _more_ professional to take personal history into account when going into business with someone,” she said, “than it is to, like, ignore it.”

“That’s…pretty good advice.”

After David hung up, Patrick asked, “Is everything okay?”

“Not everything,” David said, “but some things.” David is the type to pace around the room when he’s on the phone. When he hung up, he made his way over to his husband on the couch.

They sat in silence for a moment. Patrick put his arm around David’s shoulders and rubbed his arm.

“I guess we still have a lot of things to learn,” David finally said.

David didn’t clarify, but Patrick knew what he meant. He meant that as much as his relationship with Alexis had grown during their time together in Schitt’s Creek, there were still a lot of tests to come. They had learned how to hug, how to say “I love you,” how to talk about deeper things like dreams and relationships, how to care about each other. They still didn’t know, though, how to prioritize their relationship, how to plan their futures with the other in mind, how not to hurt each other.

“Hey, Patrick?”

“Yeah?”

“Thank you for being on my side.”

“Of course, baby,” Patrick said, kissing David’s temple. “We’re married.”

And that’s something they did now, too. They made sure to thank each other for doing the married stuff.

**Author's Note:**

> Let me know what you think!


End file.
